The conflation of tools and technologies with the ways people use them is a big problem in the copyright debate. One of the many, many examples is the way the anti-piracy crowd treats 'torrent' as a dirty word. Google endorsed this last year when they started from their search autocomplete results, and as Mike pointed out at the time, just imagine they had done the same with 'mp3' a few years ago when that was supposedly synonymous with piracy.

Defenders of this kind of filtering don't take such a forward-thinking stance, and their typical response in the torrent debate is to assert that the majority of BitTorrent traffic is likely infringing. Of course, that's not really the point: you don't look at the ratio of infringing use to legal use, but rather at the legal use by itself—if it's substantial and meaningful, then you have to go after the infringing users, not the technology as a whole. Torrents have many legitimate uses. BitTorrent is simply a good protocol for sharing large files with large groups—they are perfect for films, video games, music and of course software. Linux distros are a commonly cited example, since they are always available by (perfectly legal) torrent, but this is often brushed off as if it's an excuse and torrents are not really necessary for this.

Geek icon puts a bullet in this notion with a recent post on his blog,: One of the things that drives me crazy is the belief in Hollywood that bittorrent exists solely for stealing things. Efforts to explain that this is not necessarily true are often met with hands clamped tightly over ears, accompanied by 'I CAN'T HEAR YOU LA LA LA.'

As an example of the usefulness of bittorrent for entirely legal purposes, I present the following comparitive images: In case you can't see, the torrent is going about six times faster than a direct download, needing less than 10 minutes as compared to nearly 45. It's a simple example, but an effective one: P2P sharing is simply better sometimes. Google prides itself of directing people to the best possible information, but when their users start searching for the latest version of Ubuntu or, they won't see autocomplete suggestions for this perfectly legal (and potentially superior) means of obtaining what they want. Seems like that runs directly counter to Google's mission. It may only be a minor annoyance, but it's also pointless, and it will only get worse as more and more people embrace torrents for legitimate distribution. Humble Indie bundle distributes the bundle games over BitTorrent as well as over Steam.

Which brings me to another point: distributing load. Bittorrent is great for distributing the load of a release, so that one server isn't taking the whole brunt of the distribution of the files being released. Ubuntu can release it on their server and BitTorrent at the same time, or any other company, and reduce bandwidth costs and server load. Its another one of the great things about BitTorrent as a protocol. This can be crucial for smaller companies, if they are paying for the amount of bandwidth they use in a month.

One popular release could drain a bank account. In the case of the Indie Bundle, I certainly choose the BitTorrent option, hoping to save the Humble Bundle guys some cash so they can put out more great bundles. It is a great technology that takes full advantage of the protocols and standards the internet is based on. Pretty much any F2P (free-to-play) MMORPG these days is the same, specially using optimized software software like Pando Media Booster and Akamai Network Interface. They're basic a single-purpose torrent client that routes you to the peers closer to you speeding up the download a lot, and then when your pc is idle those softwares seed the game file. It pretty much reduces costs by replacing the need of maintaining a dedicated storage server for the cheaper way of keeping a seedbox and spreading the download with your players globally. Actually, us in networking (which includes, yeah, companies selling Internet access) do use megabits all the time.

Witness wired Ethernet speeds (10 megabits/s, 100 megabits/s, 1 gigabit/s.), wireless speeds (54 megabits/s, 150 megabits/s, 300 megabits/s.), and many many others. It also makes sense technically: the fundamental unit of information being transfered is the bit, not the byte. Which is why you shouldn't be bothering with all those esoteric terms.

Fxphd Gol101 rapidshare megaupload hotfile, Fxphd Gol101 via torrent download, Fxphd Gol101 full free download, Fxphd Gol101 rar Zip password mediafire Fxphd Gol101.

They're too easy to obfuscate. A byte is traditionally 8, 16, 32, or 64 'bits' (1 or 0). For multiples, we tack on 'Systeme International' (SI) prefixes.

'kilo' == 1,000 (eg. 1000 meters in a kilometer). 'mega' == 1,000,000. A kilobyte is 1024 bits, *because* 'echo '2^10' bc' == 1024 (which is close to 1,000). Similarly, a Megabyte is 2^20 bits or 1048576. So endeth the lesson.:-) [ ] •.

You need lessons for your lessons.:) A byte has NEVER been 'traditionally' anything but 8 bits. A 'word' may vary depending on the architecture of the CPU; for example, Motorola (on the 680x0 family) calls a word 16 bits, while IBM (on the Power/PowerPC family) calls it 32 bits. The two main measures of binary data are: nibbles: 4 bits bytes: 8 bits words: 16 bits longs: 32 bits quads: 64 bits and nibbles: 4 bits bytes: 8 bits halfwords: 16 bits words: 32 bits doublewords: 64 bits In any case, however people try to justify using bits for networking, they're still trying to justify ripping off the end user.

All the end user cares about is how much REAL data he can send or receive. How many BYTES per second the file downloads. None of the rest matters. Adding in all the overhead is ANOTHER way of trying to rip off the end user since they're advertising bits that don't go towards his download rate. It's marketing at its finest. That is, at its WORST at deception. All the end user cares about is how much REAL data he can send or receive.

How many BYTES per second the file downloads. None of the rest matters.

Adding in all the overhead is ANOTHER way of trying to rip off the end user since they're advertising bits that don't go towards his download rate. You would have a point if there was an easy way to predict what that actual data rate is in terms of payload data. But there's not. The amount of overhead can and does vary for a lot of reasons. The only accurate way to relate the speed of the underlying network is through bits per second. Do try and do it the way you suggest would not only be very inaccurate (and easier for unscrupulous companies to fudge) but it would make comparing the rates between different services much more uncertain.

Meh, this is a silly argument. Bytes are just as relevant as bits for measuring anything appropriate. Saying otherwise is like saying your speedometer should be rated in meters instead of kilometers per hour because it's more precise. It's pedantic at best since once you start adding prefixes to a unit, precision of that degree is rarely useful on a human level. How many nanometers in a lightyear?

The actually useful argument to be had is 1000 vs. 1024 for prefixes in data measurements. Personally, I have to stick with base 2 because mebibyte just sounds retarded. It's actually not just a change in units (bits vs bytes), as at the level of networking we're talking about, things don't divide into bytes. It's like in the old modem days, when the usual configuration added two bits of overhead for each byte transmitted. So, usually, a byte would equal 10 bits -- but not always, depending on the combination of start/stop/parity bits negotiated between the modems.

A modem manufacturer couldn't accurately say how many bytes could be transmitted per second as they couldn't know how many bits would be in a byte. Conceptually, similar things are happening with the various network hardware (ethernet, fiber, whatever) used today.

When light has to go back and re-traverse that last nanometer because it didn't seem right (dropped a corrupt packet in TCP), your argument will stand. Not only is the number and length of all headers unknown to the network (end-to-end principle at work), but the number of times it will have to send a packet to ensure transmission is as well. Even assuming no corruption with only the one user, someone other company could drop your packets. The network layer simply cannot say what the application layer will see. All it can do is promise so many bits of data per second. Of course, they could report the number as bytes (divide by 8) and it may be more honest for them to do so, but it would still have all the overhead wrapped up in it. That is simply not going anywhere.

And now that Cyanogenmod and other Android ROM developers are starting to also release their ROMs through torrents, it's just great! Especially since most of their previous ways of releasing have been cut off to U.S. Namely file lockers have been shut down, despite having perfectly legitimate uses. I for one won't get any Linux distro if I can't get it through torrents. The example above is a perfect reason why. It's just way faster and even if there's a hiccup while downloading, it picks up where it lefts off.

As opposed to having to start the entire direct download over again from scratch. I believe that unpredictability is what he was referring to. Torrent download speeds aren't exactly predictable, it's all dependent on how many seeds there are, whereas that of a direct download is usually constant. And there aren't always torrents with lots of seeds for what a person may be looking for, which makes the direct download a better option in those cases. Not saying torrents aren't good, they are, they just have a bit of a random factor in them that makes their reliability a bit hard to predict at times. It doesn't make this discussion pointless at all. This article is pointing out (as are most of the comments) that torrents are a really effective way of sharing files, irrespective of their legality.

The Game of Throne comment simply adds another data point. In the UK most* drivers speed on the motorway, but you don't argue that the solution is to remove motorways. The mechanism is not the problem, hence the solution is not to remove the mechanism. * If you don't believe me try sitting at 70 on a motorway and see how much traffic goes past you:¬) [ ] •.

It is basic common sense. Any technology that makes life easier for legitimate uses will be abused for illegitimate purposes. Vans are used to transport goods but they are also used in drugs trafficking and robberies; does that mean that vans should be illegal? Now, torrents are used by open source software developers and independent musicians and film makers to distribute their content as they see fit but they are also used to distribute material that infringes copyright; does that mean that torrents should be illegal?

Hollywood would do well to realise this and use torrents to their advantage. Beyond saying 'Geek icon Will Wheaton', nothing in the article was glorifying him. The article is instead focusing on the fact that torrents have many legitimate and legal uses and that much more is distributed through them than pirated movies (as the headline states).

The fact that you make a personal attack against Will Wheaton rather than address any other point in the article says a lot about you. MAKING AD HOMS ABOUT PEOPLE IS MUCH MORE PATHETIC, than glorifying them for whatever reason. And sorry to say, Will Wheaton is very much a geek icon. If you look at his list of works a very large amount of it would be considered 'geeky'. Does it extend to all copyright holders that don't distribute their works freely over torrents?

No, not at all. I think that there's a certain amount of tact that can be exercised with it, and in this case, it's appropriate to do so. Google's auto-suggest algorithm presumably works by looking at the most commonly searched-for combinations of words, and obviously lots of people download torrents of copyright works, but to suggest 'torrent' in the auto-suggest box is a bit like rubbing it in the faces of people that are looking for that content legally.

It officially states that more people are looking for the thing for free, than are paying for it, and psychologically, that encourages some people to do what everyone else is doing. Some people may not have even considered not paying for it until they see 'torrent' in the auto-suggest. I appreciate that bit-torrent is a viable way to distribute all sorts of legal content and I understand that there's a trade-off, but the truth is that the vast majority of torrents are distributing copyright content, so as I said before, I think the trade-off is worthwhile.

But to suggest 'torrent' in the auto-suggest box is a bit like rubbing it in the faces of people that are looking for that content legally. You seem to have missed the entire point. Torrents are not automatically illegal. There is plenty of content, including copyrighted content, available for free, legitimately, by torrent. And yet you still think that the mere mention of the word is 'rubbing it in the faces of people that are looking for that content legally'. It officially states that more people are looking for the thing for free, than are paying for it, and psychologically, that encourages some people to do what everyone else is doing People don't need social pressure to prefer getting stuff for free over paying for it.

And what if they are looking for content that they already know is free - like the latest Ubuntu linux, as is the example here? They won't get the suggestion that 'hey, there's a way to download this that might be much faster' Some people may not have even considered not paying for it until they see 'torrent' in the auto-suggest. Again, stop assuming that the only use for a torrent is not paying for things. I did what alex said for the music category, and here's the first 4 things sorted by # of seeders: 1.

Billy Van Dubstep Media Bundle 2. Adele - 21 (Limited Edition CD-Rip @320kbps Bonus+Cov) [PRIME] 3. Drake - Take Care (Deluxe Version) [Official Album] [CD-Rip] 4.

Rihanna - Talk That Talk (Deluxe) [2011-Album][SW] The rest of the 1st page was content from more big name artists. So please tell me how these AREN'T infringing files. If you download a torrent to get out of paying for something, (like most other torrent users do) then at least admit it. 'So please tell me how these AREN'T infringing files.' So please tell me how these ARE infringing files?

Last I checked, copyright infringement meant copying without permission right? So how do you know they don't have permission? See, you're still acting like you have precognitive law powers, so I guess you must have them. Otherwise I don't see how you can know for sure they are infringing on anything. Lets take a look at your example, no:4 Rihanna - Talk That Talk (Deluxe) [2011-Album][SW] How do you know this is 'infringement'?

Do you have proof it is? Are you Rihanna? Can you prove it, you know, in that place that proof is need for judgment to be handed down? A little place known as a court of law? If not, then we're talking about this being a case of 'Guilty until proven innocent'. In which case, you have some twisted views about how the world works. 'So please tell me how these ARE infringing files?

Last I checked, copyright infringement meant copying without permission right? So how do you know they don't have permission?' You are probably trolling, but whatever. I'll play along since you aren't even a funny troll.

A COMPANY (aka, artist's label) made a PRODUCT (aka, album/song) with the intent of selling it to make a profit. So why would a company put their own product for free on a site called the PIRATE bay, then bitch about how piracy ruins sales? But then there's the whole issue of 'HURR DURR HUR PERMISSIONZ!!!111' like you said.I think the link on TPB's site where they actually show all their legal letters can prove that they don't really have permission. If you are going to reply back to this, at least try to be a funny troll.;) I might even vote your comment as funny if I'm feeling nice.

Igo Speedcam Usa Downloads more. I think the main problem is that BitTorrent is associated immediately with stolen files, free things that others think you should pay for and dirty pictures. What it is, is a transportation system for files and data, that's it. Since the files are called torrents, it's associated with the system. The files can be useful, time-wasting, illegal or malicious. But the same can be said for anything you regularly download off the internet, so you know what, we should probably get rid of the internet so you don't hurt yourself with those evil data packets out there.

There's a bad driver out there who gets drunk, gets in his/her car, drives on the road and hits someone. Do we stop using roads, do we shut down streets and freeways becasue they are dangerous, do we condemn car manufacturers for creating this vehicle(data file)? No, we condemn and prosecute the person who operated the vehicle (the creator of the data file or torrent file). But only him, we don't do that to all the good drivers out there driving safely. I know, Iknow, but Shadey Hollywood and others go after the dirty, rotten stinking pirates out there, aren't they trying to keep us safe?

You can argue about that, but they don't do it the same way we do in every other situation, why do they get a free ride? Is it because they brought us classics like Gigli, Troll 2, From Justin to Kelly, Santa Claus conquers the Martians and many others great cinematic gems? I guess the point I was trying to make at the beginning of this before it got away from me, is that BitTorrent as a system is not illegal, it is not wrong and it is not damaging. It is a tool, a tool that is useful and one of the best options out there right now.

To not use it is incredibly stupid and puts you behind others who use it to their business advantage. Further proof that the protocol has a place, the creator has been working to adapt it for live video streaming to cut costs. I can think of more web sites that legally distribute torrents. Here are some: •. If you pay for an album digitally, they distribute it to you via BitTorrent. • is based off Linux Mint (and with a lot of eye candy) and like all other Linux distros, it's released via BitTorrent. • OC Remix's terrific remix album, like distribute their albums via torrent.

It's legal because the the remixers, original composers, and original video game companies all approve, and OC Remix facing legal trouble is as rare as seeing a comet in the sky. Those are some legal torrents off the top of my head.

If it didn't take me that much time to think of legal torrents, maybe that says more about the *AAs than the people who actually download the torrents. DECEMBER 1ST, 2019 - WASHINGTON, DC - It was a cold day in political hell as Jane's Law, a new bill passed by the house and senate and signed by the president earlier today, has officially banned the sale and use of all standard hammers in the United States today. The law was written and named after Jane Brown, the 45-year old mother and housewife who was bludgeoned to death during a home invasion nearly 2 years ago today. Advocates of the new law dismissed the claims of home builders and others stating 'Hammers are a dangerous form of weaponry that cause hundreds of deaths each year.

Jane's Law gives law enforcement a powerful new tool to save these lives.' When we tried to reach the president of the American Homebuilders Association for comment, he said something inaudible, clearly intoxicated, then shot himself in the head. Professor James Gray at Harvard University, a proponent of the hand tools industry said, 'Today really is a sad day for America and a true defeat for common sense. Yes, hammers can be used for malice.

So can screwdrivers, drills, and virtually any other hand tool. Despite this, we have always recognized as a society that a tool, even one with potential to be misused by crafty criminals, also has the ability to be used to create houses, repair furniture, and even destroy things we actually should destroy.' When asked for his view on the subject, Senator Ron Dewings had this to say: 'This new law strikes a blow for freedom. American citizens will never again have to worry about a shadowy intruder in the night wielding one of these weapons of mass terror.'

The proceeding is a fake news report I generated both in an effort to finally achieve a 'most insightful comment of the week' nod, and also to illustrate the key point here that many who would see BitTorrent banned seem to miss: You can punish behavior, but you cannot punish the tool. Any tool, every tool, all tools have the potential to be used for good. Even implements of torture can be used to craft leather belts. When you start to ban a tool rather than it's (mis)use, this is what you get. Do you really want us to go back to hammering houses together with a flat rock?